Let's Talk About Levels or Tiers of Success

[Micah Sweet]

Players could very well find it simply fun to choose for themselves. Why should it be adversarial? I don't understand. I like choosing. I like to have more agency, I find it fun. Nothing to do with adverserial GM-ing. It's just another kind of balance, another kind of way to spread the narrative authority.
It is, for instance, the standard in a game like Legend in the Mist. Players choose their "effects".

That to me is a recipe for bias unless you have just the right sort of players. In my experience it's very hard to choose negative outcomes for your own PC.

 

[BenjaminPey]

See, that sounds adversarial to me. Unless you're playing with children or immature people, there's no reason their choice will be more ill-adivsed than the DM's.

 

[Micah Sweet]

See, that sounds adversarial to me. Unless you're playing with children or immature people, there's no reason their choice will be more ill-adivsed than the DM's.

Ill-advised for whom? Players have a personal stake in their PC's well-being, so I don't find it at all unusual that many would struggle choosing negative effects for their own characters. By contrast, the GM has responsibility for the entire setting and everything in it except the PCs, so they are less likely to be heavily invested in any specific bit of it.

 

[Argyle King]

For me, this is how I figure out what the various degrees mean:

•I start by considering what the players are trying to do. What is it that they would like to accomplish?
•What is the best possible result? Whatever that is, that is your ceiling.
•What is the worst possible result? Whatever that is, that is your floor.
•Everything else is between that.

Note: Just because you can have whatever arbitrary number of steps of possible success/failure doesn't mean you need to use that many steps.

Sometimes, a binary yes/no really is The best way to handle something. Did I pick the lock?

Sometimes, maybe success+1 looks so much like success+2 that there isn't a difference. In those cases, reduce the number of steps. The simplest example I've seen of that is something like "...success means X; success by 5 or more means X+1; critical success means X+2..." and the opposite of "failure means Y; failure by 5 or more means Y-1; critical fail means Y-2."

 

[soviet]

Ok. Can you explain then? Because that's how it reads to me.

OK. I tease you sometimes but I've had enough real discussions with you to give you a proper answer.

The rules structure discussed inherently gives the GM an authority over what a success 'means'. If I roll to persuade someone of something, and I succeed, and there are no degrees of success, then that person is persuaded. If there are partial successes, and one-hit successes, and two-hit successes, and critical-successes - well, what did my single or partial success mean? Are they persuaded? Are they persuaded temporarily, reluctantly, with a cost, with future very bad consequences, not as good as a critical success, what? It's all undefined and therefore open to GM interpretation.

This rules structure inherently prioritises the GM's interpretation over mine. It's a barrier to communication. Sometimes I might get a partial or a one-hit success and get everything I want, because it suits the GM's idea of what should happen. Sometimes I will get a partial or a one-hit success and get very little of what I want, because, well soviet, it's not a two-hit success is it, and what I want doesn't suit the GM's idea of what should happen.

This doesn't make it adversarial. All the people I play with are my good friends. But it does prioritise the GM's view over mine. It makes the GM a larger driver of the fiction than I am. Their views carry more weight than mine do. This is a very common way to play and there is nothing wrong with it. But it is not the only way to play. And doing something else does not have to come from a place of 'the tyrant GM is bullying the poor players'. It can come from a place of 'I as GM want players to have more say in this, so I do not want the power to interpret or finesse their dice rolls into the fiction. I want the rules to tell me clearly what happened'.

 

[soviet]

Ill-advised for whom? Players have a personal stake in their PC's well-being, so I don't find it at all unusual that many would struggle choosing negative effects for their own characters.

So saying players might be self-interested consciously or unconsciously is normal, but saying that GMs might be is adversarial? What happens when a player becomes the GM, or the GM becomes a player?

By contrast, the GM has responsibility for the entire setting and everything in it except the PCs,

No they don't. There are many games for which this is absolutely false.

 

[GMMichael]

Can you give an example of that?

Successes counting system: OWoD (if I recall...)
Roll your d10s and each 7 or higher is a success. Opponent rolls its d10s as well, and if it has more successes than you - your successes are actually a failure.

Roll under systems: (for lack of a better term)
To "succeed" on something, you roll under your attribute. Okay, you succeed. Then your opponent blocks or dodges, and "succeeds" higher than you. Your success is now a failure.

 

[Micah Sweet]

OK. I tease you sometimes but I've had enough real discussions with you to give you a proper answer.

The rules structure discussed inherently gives the GM an authority over what a success 'means'. If I roll to persuade someone of something, and I succeed, and there are no degrees of success, then that person is persuaded. If there are partial successes, and one-hit successes, and two-hit successes, and critical-successes - well, what did my single or partial success mean? Are they persuaded? Are they persuaded temporarily, reluctantly, with a cost, with future very bad consequences, not as good as a critical success, what? It's all undefined and therefore open to GM interpretation.

This rules structure inherently prioritises the GM's interpretation over mine. It's a barrier to communication. Sometimes I might get a partial or a one-hit success and get everything I want, because it suits the GM's idea of what should happen. Sometimes I will get a partial or a one-hit success and get very little of what I want, because, well soviet, it's not a two-hit success is it, and what I want doesn't suit the GM's idea of what should happen.

This doesn't make it adversarial. All the people I play with are my good friends. But it does prioritise the GM's view over mine. It makes the GM a larger driver of the fiction than I am. Their views carry more weight than mine do. This is a very common way to play and there is nothing wrong with it. But it is not the only way to play. And doing something else does not have to come from a place of 'the tyrant GM is bullying the poor players'. It can come from a place of 'I as GM want players to have more say in this, so I do not want the power to interpret or finesse their dice rolls into the fiction. I want the rules to tell me clearly what happened'.

Ah. I understand where you're coming from, thank you. I am obviously not one of those GMs who want players to have control of things their PCs don't, of course.

 

[Micah Sweet]

So saying players might be self-interested consciously or unconsciously is normal, but saying that GMs might be is adversarial? What happens when a player becomes the GM, or the GM becomes a player?



No they don't. There are many games for which this is absolutely false.

It's not false in any game I'm interested in playing for more than a one-shot.

 

[soviet]

It's not false in any game I'm interested in playing for more than a one-shot.

Sure but this thread and all threads on ENWorld are not about your preferences. It is false for RPGs in general.